


divergence of paths

by azu_no_ephemeron



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Hasumi Keito (mentioned) - Freeform, picking apart a character and their thoughts i guess, spoilers for the story crossroads
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 16:34:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29844333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/azu_no_ephemeron/pseuds/azu_no_ephemeron
Summary: It's on a cold spring evening, from inside the jam-packed underground live house, that Sakuma Rei decides he's had it.
Kudos: 4





	divergence of paths

**Author's Note:**

> i get inside sakuma rei's head for a bit. because the story crossroads changed me as a person and that is everyone's problem.

It's on a cold spring evening, from inside the jam-packed underground live house, that Sakuma Rei decides he's had it.

With the cacophony of guitar chords and drumming roaring in his skull, sweat dripping down his neck and back and his grip on the microphone so tight he's sure his fingers are cramping, he sings. The words he carelessly let slip to the grey-haired child -- Oogami, was it? -- course through his veins like poison, coil around his throat like a serpent. He prays the trembling he feels isn't visible to the audience, doesn't make itself apparent in the song he belts out. It is all he can do to trust in his voice -- though his resolve may waver, his voice has never failed him.

He _does_ feel his resolve wavering, though. As boldly as he may have declared his intent to send that bond to its grave, taking concrete action is always harder.

But what _bouzu_ is planning is a war -- a massacre, even. Rei doesn't want conflict. He's seen enough of those on his trips overseas; knows how they all end. Knows that at the end of the path of carnage, no one really _wins_.

But most of all, he's tired of carrying the world on his back. He's never asked for this -- not his otherworldly charisma nor his wisdom beyond his years. It both weighs down on him and simultaneously pulls his shoulders and knees that much further from the ground that humans walk upon. Even as _bouzu_ admits his own weakness, positively _begs_ him to help, Rei knows Keito doesn't see him as himself, but as a supernatural something else. He's just like hundreds upon hundreds of others who constantly stare right through Rei, as if only focused on the throne he sits upon -- a throne _they_ have constructed for him. He's had enough of being alone by no choice of his own, and for a while, he had really, truly, harboured hope that _bouzu_ might have been able to stand side by side with him. The stern, impatient, childish boy who had screamed about Rei being an angel of death when they first met -- he thought that boy would have been someone to finally end this numbing solitude and breathe some life into his rotting corpse. But the reverence in _bouzu_ 's voice leaves a bitter taste on Rei's tongue and reminds him that perhaps this is his fate. And so, even though it is no easy task for him to gaze coldly down on _bouzu_ 's bowed head, sharpen his next words into a spear, and aim them at his "friend"'s heart...

_Aha_. Now _there's_ an expression that ignites an ember of life in him.

Rei doesn't want to be worshipped as a god, or feared as a demon; he wants to be Sakuma Rei, the superstar idol. He's here to sing and dance, to love even the damned and scorned, to chase _his_ dreams and to _live_ the life that lies ahead of him.

If that's a sin, then so be it. He'll burn in the depths of hell with these foolish, selfish, _human_ desires of his.

With the cacophony of cheers and yells from the delinquents in the audience roaring in his skull, eyes averted from Keito's face and the grip that worldly chains have on his limbs and throat finally loosening, he sings.

His voice does not fail him today.

**Author's Note:**

> i am so *clenches fist* over crossroads. and i intend to write one more chapter for this but idk when. feel free to hmu on [twitter](https://twitter.com/ephemeral_smile) if you like the oddballs and want to cry about them


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